Emma had the perfect trifecta: a long-term job as an engineer designing sewers; a steady relationship with her reliable boyfriend; and an adoring and creative best friend (about whom she wasn't quite ready to admit her unrequited feelings). Then early one morning, a phone call changed her world forever. Now she's having nightmares that threaten to disrupt the space-time continuum -- nightmares of hiding from bombs in basements, of glass shattering from nearby explosions. But these disturbing dreams, in which she inhabits the body of a young girl named Lily, seem all too real, and Emma's waking life begins to be affected by the events that transpire in this mysterious wartime landscape. Convinced she has been given a chance to save a life, Emma tries to rescue Lily from heartache, but ultimately it is through Lily that Emma finds her way back. The Almond in the Apricot navigates connections formed across space and time and explores love, grief, and the possibility that the universe might be bigger than either Emma or Lily ever imagined.

Serial rights targeting The New Yorker, Los Angeles Review of Books, The Paris Review, Literary Hub, and others Print and digital publicity targeting Texas Monthly, Dallas Morning News, KERA,Electric Literature, Book Riot, Rain Taxi, Full Stop, World Literature Today, Asymptote, The Millions, and others Promotion at or events pitched for Brooklyn Book Festival, Texas Book Festival, and Winter Institute Review copies will be sent targeting all major print and digital literary media outlets, reviewers, and booksellers; additional copies available upon request Promotion on the publisher's website (deepvellum.org), Twitter feed (@deepvellum), and Facebook page (/deepvellum); and publisher's e-newsletter

About the Author
Sara Goudarzi's work has appeared in The New York Times, Scientific American, National Geographic News, The Adirondack Review and Drunken Boat, among others. She is the author of Leila's Day at the Pool and Amazing Animals from Scholastic Inc. Sara has taught writing at NYU and is a 2017 Writers in Paradise Les Standiford fellow and a Tin House alumna. Born in Tehran, she grew up in Iran, Kenya and the U.S. and currently lives in Brooklyn.

Reviews
A Poets & Writers "New and Noteworthy Book"

A Loan Stars January 2022 Adult Top Ten Pick

"At its heart, this is a story about the deep ties of real and true friendships, one at its end and the other just beginning." -Tessa Terry, Booklist

"A New Jersey woman tries to understand how she stumbled upon a parallel universe after losing her best friend in Goudarzi's exquisite and magical debut." -Publishers Weekly

"A beautiful, strange, shape-shifting novel about the movement of grief and longing, The Almond in the Apricot had me at Emma's first dream of Lily and didn't let go. Sara Goudarzi has written a wonderful and compelling novel, made all the more astonishing by the fact that it is her first. I loved it." -Ethan Rutherford, author of Farthest South & Other Stories and The Peripatetic Coffin

"The Almond in the Apricot is a dazzling meditation on loss and the power of connection. Truly, I can't think of a more perfect story for our time." -Heather Harper Ellett, author of Ain't Nobody Nobody

"The Almond in the Apricot is brimful of mystery and longing, a page-turner that derives its suspense from vast and resonant questions about the layers of the self and of the world. Movingly, Sara Goudarzi's debut novel plumbs the depths of grief, desire, and love." -Clare Beams, author of The Illness Lesson

"A rocket of a read-a propulsive and explosive ride. I love it when a novel manages to be this smart and this gripping at the same time. In The Almond in the Apricot, two lives come together across time and space to form one hell of a story. Sara Goudarzi's impressive debut shows she's one to watch, and one to read." -Mat Johnson, author of Pym and Loving Day




Book Information
ISBN 9781646051090
Author Sara Goudarzi
Format Hardback
Page Count 252
Imprint Deep Vellum Publishing
Publisher Deep Vellum Publishing